The UN Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women) will help Vietnam implement a project to improve the assessment and inspection of the implementation of national strategies and programmes on gender equality.

The 2.3 million USD project, inked between UN Women and the Vietnamese Ministry of Labour, War Invalids and Social Affairs (MoLISA) in Hanoi on October 23, will be implemented from September 2012 to December 2016.

It aims to improve knowledge and skills for State officials to effectively supervise national strategies and programmes on gender equality and helps set up an evidence-based database for the law-making process and inter-sectoral coordination on gender equality in order to share achievements and experiences in this field.

Speaking at the signing ceremony, MoLISA Deputy Minister Nguyen Thanh Hoa, who is also Vice President of the National Committee for the Advancement of Women, affirmed the Vietnamese Government’s commitments to ensuring gender equality and implementing the project.

He stressed that improving Government officials’ State management skills is the key to the successful implementation of national strategies and programmes on gender equality.

The UN Women Chief Representative in Vietnam, Suzette Mitchell, affirmed that her entity will assist the MoLISA in the work and share lessons on the impacts of gender mainstreaming and budgeting.

UN Women is willing to continue supporting Vietnam’s State management agencies in policies to empower women so that the country can successfully implement Millennium Development Goals and the Agenda after 2015, she said.

The MoLISA and UN Women have vowed close cooperation to effectively implement the 2011- 2020 National Strategy and 2011-2015 National Programme on Gender Equality, ensuring that important gender issues will be included in the country’s laws, policies and development programmes.-VNA